_Paul appeals to the Thessalonians themselves as able to testify to his Boldness, Straightforwardness, and Disinterestedness, while resident among them._ In chap. 1 Thessalonians 1:9 Paul had alluded to two features of his visit to Thessalonica, the power which had characterized his preaching, and t... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:1. FOR YOURSELVES KNOW. What I say of our preaching I do not say without warrant, nor need I rest it on the testimony of others, for yourselves are my witnesses. THAT IT HATH NOT BEEN VAIN. This is generally supposed to refer not to the effects but to the essential character of th... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:2. BUT. We should expect that this word would introduce a logically exact opposition to the preceding clause, and that Paul would proceed to narrate the results of his preaching. Instead of doing so, he speaks of his fearlessness in preaching, and permits his readers to infer the r... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:3. FOR. Paul proceeds to show that his manner of preaching was in keeping with the fact that the Gospel he preached was from God. It was not a private idea or invitation of his own, but a message with which God had entrusted him. This they might be sure of, from what he states in t... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:4. APPROVED BY GOD. This expression indicates a selection on the part of God of men suitable for the work which He designed to do. Paul was chosen to be an apostle, because of a natural fitness for the office. But it is not on any natural fitness Paul leans for his authority, but o... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:5. Nor introduces proof that he had not striven to please men; for he who seeks to please men, flatters them, which Paul had not done. NOR A CLOAK OF COVETOUSNESS. In Greece some men made handsome incomes by teaching new systems of philosophy; but Paul's preaching was in no sense... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:6. NOR OF MEN SOUGHT WE GLORY. It was natural for persons who could not believe in any motives more disinterested than those which commonly animate men, to refer Paul's conduct to that which undoubtedly does produce many of the greatest actions viz., love of glory and power, of pre... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:7. BUT introduces the positive side of Paul's account of his demeanour. GENTLE, not severe, distant, official, imperious. AMONG YOU, with some allusion to the familiarity of his con' verse with them; he made himself their equal. NURSE, _i.e._ nursing mother. Paul had aimed on... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:8. SO, _i.e._ in like manner as the nursing mother. NOT THE GOSPEL OF GOD ONLY, BUT OUR OWN SOULS ALSO. So genuine and cordial was the love of Paul and his companions for the Thessalonians, that they did not merely deliver their message as officials seeking to discharge a respons... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:9. TOIL AND TRAVAIL. These words, and the expression ‘night and day,' are intended to bring out strongly the very hard and exhausting labour in which Paul was involved by his desire to support himself while ministering in the Gospel to the Thessalonians. That Paul did not mean to i... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:10. Paul gives a general summary of the character of his demeanour in Thessalonica as a minister of Christ. JUSTLY, _i.e._ righteously. THAT BELIEVE. The reason of this addition is not obvious; probably it is inserted as a general term for the church on the members of which his... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:11. AS YE KNOW. An expansion and further confirmation of the preceding verse. He particularizes the carefulness he had shown for individuals. EXHORTED, AND COMFORTED, AND CHARGED. Using in each case the kind of admonition which seemed most appropriate, exhorting, or kindly encour... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:12. THAT YE WOULD WALK WORTHY OF GOD. This was the object of Paul's exhortations. He found that men could profess to accept God's calling and yet live very much as they had done before; that they needed to be told to walk worthy of God. And it is a consideration which helps those w... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:13. FOR THIS CAUSE, referring to what follows. His thankfulness was no doubt intensified by the apparent unlikelihood that the word of a stranger, a Jew, without wealth or influence, without letters of commendation, without even a good command of Greek and a good accent; of a man s... [ Continue Reading ]
_Paul appeals to their Endurance of the Persecution in proof of the Genuine efficacy of their Reception of the Word of God._ Paul again gives thanks for the reception which the Thessalonians had accorded to his preaching, and finds evidence at once of the efficacy of the word and of the reality of... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:14. For introduces evidence of the actual working of God's word in the believing Thessalonians. This evidence was that they had been persecuted by their own countrymen. This persecution was of itself a testimony to the reality of their Christianity. ‘If ye were of the world, the wo... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:15. WHO KILLED BOTH THE LORD JESUS. As the unbelieving Thessalonians had persecuted their Christian townsmen, so had the Jews persecuted Jesus, and the prophets and the apostles. They had ‘driven out' the apostles, and endeavoured to prevent them from preaching salvation to the Gen... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:16. HINDERING US FROM SPEAKING or, seeing that they hinder us; this clause specifying the chief instance in which the Jews incurred the displeasure of God and showed their narrow hatred of their fellows. TO FILL UP. It was not the Jews' intention that this conduct of theirs should... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:17. BUT WE. The ‘we' is emphatic, equivalent to ‘so far as concerns us;' and Paul is induced to speak of his own feelings towards them, apparently for the sake of removing any bitter feeling which the Thessalonians might have harboured regarding his absence during their troubles. I... [ Continue Reading ]
_Paul describes the Feelings he had towards the Thessalonians after he had left them._ This paragraph is remarkable chiefly as a manifestation of the ardent affection which Paul felt for his churches. It was with pain he absented himself from them, with difficulty he was prevented from returning, w... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:18. EVEN I PAUL. In saying ‘ _we_ would have come,' Paul includes Silas and Timothy, and by this appended clause he means to emphasize his own strong personal longing to revisit his friends. It was not a mere desire to send an official deputation, but the longing of an individual a... [ Continue Reading ]
1 Thessalonians 2:19. FOR. Paul accounts for his earnest desire to revisit Thessalonica. I thus earnestly long to see you, for there is nothing which affords the same prospect, or the same present enjoyment, or the same substantial satisfaction, as my Christian children in your church. OUR HOPE. T... [ Continue Reading ]